


The Gentle Snowflakes of Winter

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Civil War (Marvel), Fighting, Fluff, Gen, Like a shit load, Sadness, Suicide, This is my first fic on here so I don't know how the tags work, blink and you miss it - Freeform, sorry - Freeform, very tiny bit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 12:27:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5539961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens when (if) Steve dies in Captain america: Civil War. A.K.A. Bucky gets revenge and everyone dies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gentle Snowflakes of Winter

The Gentle Snowflakes of Winter

Steve was in his arms. Stark was watching, from a distance. He didn't care. Steve was bleeding, ragged breaths escaping from his mouth.

“No, no, no, no, nooo...” Bucky whined – this couldn't happen, he just got him back, his... friend, the only thing he had left, and such a beautiful thing, important, impossible, draining, slipping away in his arms. 

“No, Steve, please stay... Steve, please, we can still get out of this, I'll get you a doctor, don't you close your eyes-” 

The tears started leaking from his own- 

“Steve-” 

“Buck... You don't have to... It's fine”

Steve got it out with difficulty, ribs broken, and all the tire of the world in his bones.

“No, no, no, nothing is fine, Steve, please stay, you can't-”

“You always knew I could, Buck. There always was this possibility. It's okay, Bucky. It's enough. This was enough. You were enough. I'm done. I'm so tired, Buck, so, so tired...”

Bucky frantically tried to stop the bleeding by ripping off a piece of fabric from his own clothes and wrapping it around his wounds. It didn't work, the blood just kept flowing.

“Buck, you don't have to, it won't make a difference, you sh-ouldn't, just let it be”

Steve's breaths were less deep and more like gasping for air now, having to take a break every few words.

“No! No, Steve, c'mon, we, just, I just, -”

“Bucky, do you respect me?” Steve said, muttered, whispered actually. 

“Steve-” His voice broke-”I love you”

He tried to say something, so Bucky leaned over, closer to his mouth. Steve just gently kissed his forehead. Half in shock, he leaned back again, causing him to only just hear his last words:

“Love – you too...” Steve's head fell to one side, facing away from Bucky.

This drew a scream from Bucky- long, almost animalistic, broken at the edges, dripping with grief, rage, the most basic heartbreak. The only thing he could say, force out of his mouth before he doubled over in body-wrecking sobs was a very small, high-pitched “No”. Then he held on to Steve's still warm body, crying.

After a while of only the sound of his loud mourning, Bucky started to chant that same word, at first softly, but ever louder and louder until he was screaming at the top of his lungs. This was the moment Tony chose to send his iron legion to separate the two and take Steve's now deceased body away. The robots pulled a howling Bucky away from his friend. As soon as they were airborne with Steve, he ran away.

Tony decided to let him grieve in peace and didn't go after him.

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - 

He looked at the corpse in front of him. Steve- or his body- was laying on a metal table.

They were in a clean, very white room. There was a thin blanket that was slightly smudged with blood covering his entire figure, except for the face.

Now everything had calmed down, Tony had begun thinking.

He thought about the drawings he'd found in an old folder of his dads.

They had obviously not been in the best shape, but they were pretty good. Early ones made with a pencil, on cheap paper. Later ones with ink. There had been a lot of them depicting a brunet. From the very few pictures, he'd been able to tell it was Barnes. A younger James, a teenager, one with dirt on his face, one while sitting in a living room chair, laying in the grass in military clothing, smiling. Some of them were certainly posed, others drawn from memory. There were a few flowers, a number of ordinary objects, landscapes, maps, a very rare self-portrait. Some were drawn quickly, in a hurry, just to not forget the moment. Others were very precise, with perfect shading and lighting, in order to document it correctly, perfectly.

He'd also seen the things Steve had made after waking up. He remembered thinking the life had gone out of them. They were cold, distant, without a lot of emotion. There had been one though, with a face he'd crossed out, furiously, there were a few tear-smudges. It was of Barnes, with short hair, from before they had found out he was still alive.

He thought about how Steve never really let anyone in. He'd never let Tony close. Probably opened up more to Sam, but not completely. Maybe not even to James. Had he before the war? Before Steve had become Captain America, the star spangled man with a plan? Was he then as secretive, closed up, keeping everything inside, minding his image and composure?

Only James knew, and Tony figured he didn't really fancy him right now. 

There had been very few moments where Steve showed himself.

He remembered a conversation he'd had with him. It started out as a normal conversation, but then Steve had suddenly said, out of the blue: “You know, I won't die unless someone kills me. The serum prevents that. I don't even age.” He'd taken a sip from the drink he held, which was almost 100 % alcohol. Nobody had said anything about it. “It's both a curse and a blessing, I guess.” Tony remembers making a joke about him being a really fancy rock, or something like that. Even at the time he didn't know why he'd thought that was a good idea. Steve'd just looked away and there had been a silence.

He thought about how Steve had always been ready to sacrifice himself for what needed to be done. He thought about how many times he'd applied to the army, without even really knowing what it would be like. He thought about how well Steve held the team together, not even minding himself, always worrying about the others. He had a quite black-and-white morality, but that was certainly beneficial in critical situations. Little less handy in others. Stubborn bastard.

He walked closer to the remains of his previous friend-like colleague and felt his arms. Looked at his face. There was a streak of blood, or dirt, on his cheek.

He remembered the pictures, and the measurements his dad had taken. Steve had been very small, about the height Tony was when he was fourteen. He'd also been very thin, almost underfed. Little to no muscle-mass. What a contrast to now. Howard had pumped him up, to this big, healthy demigod. That was the other thing. Steve had about every disease he could have had. Most likely on the verge of dying every winter.

He lived with Barnes, right? He probably took care of him. James had work on the docks, Steve had had a lot of little, undocumented jobs. They could only just get by. 

Tony thought about how he'd woken up almost a century later, all of his friends dead. About how distant he was in the beginning. He thought about how his parents had died at such an early age. He thought about how James had been all he had had, and then fell of a train in front of him while he could do nothing to stop it. He thought about the bawling friend he'd had to physically pull away. He thought about the pressure of holding up his image as the perfect man, of the fame, of always doing what is right. He thought about how Steve never bled on anyone. He thought about his absolute desperation to find Barnes. He thought about his rage at the Sokovia accords. He thought about the fights they always had. About the jokes he cracked even mid-battle. About the optimism he always had. Tony had never really known if that was just a facade, but it helped nonetheless. About how serious he was in the right moments. About the time he was from. About everything he'd lost and been through. 

And in this moment, going over all this, Tony finally understood the man behind the shield. It was sour, bitter how much too late it was now.

He tried to wipe away the bit of dirt on Steve's face. He only smudged it out. It stood out almost painfully on the pale, lifeless face. Oh, how different the expression on there had been not that long ago. 

Flashes of teeth, blond hair, white and blue, screaming:  


“WAS IT WORTH IT? WAS IT?”  
Punch.  
“WAS THIS WORTH IT, TONY?”  
Kick.

He felt the bruise on his arm. A few tears escaped his eyes. With a broken voice Tony said: “No, Steve. It wasn't worth it.”

Then the lights went out.

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Bucky was full of an emotion he couldn't quite specify. Was it rage? Grief? Hopelessness? A mix of those? He wasn't sure, but he did know that it was about Steve and directed against Stark.

He'd snuck into the mostly concrete building he knew Tony was. It'd been a makeshift, so neither Jarvis or a proper security system had been installed adequately yet. He found Tony's suits in a closet and destroyed them. He thought Jarvis would alarm Tony about this, but he had taken out his earpiece.

Bucky stumbled upon a piece of tech in the wall that looked important and randomly pulled out a few wires. The lights went out. Luckily he was trained for this. Stark wasn't.

Perfect.

Tony frantically tried to find to find his earpiece in the dark. He had to pat several unidentifiable surfaces until he found it in the window frame. He called for Jarvis, to give him one of his suits. Only Bucky had dismantled them all, except for an unarmed prototype. When that finally got to him, he stepped outside of the room, lighting his path with a flickering lamp in one of his shoulders. 

They met each other in a room made of concrete that had moss growing on the walls, dirty water dripping down them, and massive windows showing the snowstorm that was raging outside. Inside it wasn't exactly warm either. A chilly breeze was flowing around them, giving them goosebumps not only caused by adrenaline.

As soon as he saw Tony, Bucky charged at him even though the other had stuck his arms out defensively. After laying down a few punches, he started to crush his helmet. He did try to defend himself, but the suit wasn't competent enough to face the furious master assassin. So Tony turned to what he had left. His wit.

“Please, James-you don't have to do this-”

Bucky just proceeded punching and kicking him back against the wall.

“I didn't have another choice-”

A particular vicious kick.

“You would have done the same-”

He was against the wall now. Bucky's face twisted into an ugly scowl and he very lowly growled “Don't you dare”

“Barnes, stop. Steve wouldn't have wanted this.”

Bucky stopped for a moment, and then exploded.

“STEVE IS DEAD, STARK” he yelled and started to pull out the arc reactor. Without it Tony would be a limp puppet, caught in his own armour. He was seriously terrified now. 

“Bucky, I'm begging you, -”

“Don't call me that.” 

And with those words the reactor finally exited the suit and Tony fell to the floor. 

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Bucky pulled him out of the building, into the fields filled with snow. Half a mile further, a ravine came into the line of his sight.

When he got to the edge, everything looked like how it was when he fell to his almost-death. There was a light, chilly breeze. Snowflakes gently fell from the clouds. The sharp, dark, nearly black rocks stood out against the white of the winter. The only difference was that this one was much deeper and it wasn't going to an accident. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up straight.

Tony couldn't say anything, without power the microphone didn't work. Bucky laid him down at the side of the canyon. He waited a bit, looking at the man beneath him, thinking about his faint resemblance to Howard. About when he caused a car crash. When he could see eyes lighting up behind a steering wheel just before their owner swerved off the road. Checking. Deciding the work was done. He shrewed his eyes shut, trying to get rid of the images of the bodies, the blood, the knives, the guns, the cold, the... machine. The wiper. He shook his head, like character in cartoons do. It seemed to work. Then he shoved him off, almost disrespectfully, with his foot. To get it over with. He watched the red and yellow death cell plunge towards the white-black checkered bottom.

He heard a faint 'clunk'. There was no way he survived that.

Tony couldn't see anything, only feel the very few things his armour would allow. A threshold. Some rocks. After a while his back became seriously cold and he knew he was outside. Then the movement stopped for a minute. An abrupt push and he suddenly felt that awful dropping feeling. He screamed, but couldn't properly emotionally respond before he and his suit slammed against the very lowest peaked stone and died.

When Bucky got back at the facility, he immediately went looking for Steve. He didn't know where he was, so he just went into every room until he found the one with the metal table. When he saw him again, laying there in that icy room under the piece of cloth, everything inside him broke a little more.

It was dark and cold and bleak, strained, tense, and nothing that Steve ever was. Tony took all away from Steve and laid him in the most frigid environment imaginable. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. Steve deserved warmth, and flowers, and beautiful music at his burial. Bucky couldn't give him any of that. He laid his hand on his forehead, like he had done way back, to check if Steve had a fever again. It was cold.

It was wrong.

Bucky remembered that Tony's allies would probably arrive shortly so he went looking inside of the other rooms. When he had found something adequate, he wrapped Steve in it tightly and he departed the house to go back to the ravine. It was an old red blanket.

It had started snowing harder again and the infinitely different flakes got stuck in his hair and his clothes, and fell on the quilt, making the faded colour appear more vibrant. Bucky knew he could keep Steve neither warm nor safe anymore, not since the asshole joined the army, and certainly not after he died, but that didn't stop him from keeping up the pretend. He could not accept that yet and just hugged him closer.

When he got to the edge of the canyon again, carrying Steve bridal-style, Bucky looked at his friends face. The body that was way too big for him in his eyes, like a sweater can be too big, was hidden behind the cloth and he could fool himself for a few seconds that this actually was his tiny best friend Steve, that was always cold and sick in winters, lips too pale, arms too thin, needing him to reach the upper shelf and to protect against frozen air. Getting him hot soup, and sleeping together just to keep him warm, beating up the people Steve picked fights with.

But then he felt the weight of the man, and the illusion was gone. This was the guy that he had to protect with a sniper rifle, that had had to carry the weight of the world upon his shoulders, that despite everything still tried to maintain his morality in everything he did, the guy that had changed so much, that was changed so much about, that he was merely a shell, a shadow of what and who he used to be. So was Bucky. He looked at Steve with melancholy in his heart and realized that things would never have been the same again, even if they would have gotten out of this alive. And yet, his friend still was in there somewhere... 

Or used to be.

Bucky didn't believe in an afterlife, or a next life. He thought souls die together with the cells. He wasn't sure if that made this easier. He did a step forward.

He stroked Steve's hair out of his face. Cleaned up the dirt with the glove that had gotten completely soaked because of the snow. He was cold to the bone. Another step.

He leaned over and lovingly kissed Steve on the forehead, like he had done when the other had kicked the bucket. When Bucky let himself back up, his tears had already turned to ice in his hair. He hadn't even noticed he was crying yet.

He stepped the last step and was tumbling through the frosty air now. It stung his skin and snowflakes slammed into his face. Bucky grabbed Steve closer to his chest and buried his face in his shoulder. The ground was approaching. He turned so he was head-down. The blanket was flapping like crazy around them. He held on tight.

Everything went black.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is the first fic I ever wrote, and thus also the first I ever posted on here. Criticism and tips are very welcome. Please point out any spelling/grammar mistakes, English is not my native language. It would absolutely make my day if you left comments or kudos!


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